Ten O'Clock News; MBM scandal

[Beeping] [Francis Bellotti] Part of the problem, I think, Chris, is that once the motion for a new trial was brought and these names became public, names that were known to the United States attorney and to the judge, people wanted me to convene a grand jury on cases on which the statute of limitations had already run. Well, that would be a violation of the canon of legal ethics for prosecutors. I could be censured for that, as having done something totally unethical, an abuse of prosecutorial discretion, to bring grand jury proceedings and seek indictments in cases we have no probability of success. The statute has run. Secondly, it cast totally aside the secrecy of the grand jury. [Reporter Chris Lydon] He's been warning against witch hunts. Clearly he thinks of the hit or miss Crime Commission of the 1960s as a precedent to be avoided, even though it propelled Attorney General Ed Brooke to the United States Senate. [Bellotti] Remember the history of it. You remember the, uh... I can think of, just right off the top my head, two representatives who were

indicted. The case was ultimately dismissed, never came to trial. A former governor was indicted. His case never got to a jury; there was a directed verdict on it. A commissioner of ministration in finance, who is a former Republican speaker of the house, was indicted. Four, five, six years later his case was dismissed for want of prosecution by Elliot Richardson, another Republican. I would have to assume, assuming that Elliot was ethical, that there wasn't enough of a case to go forward on. Well, that's not a very good history. Those people were destroyed; their reputations damaged irreparably. They never had their day in court. [Lydon] Bellotti's taken some newspaper heat for his caution for insisting that a special investigation be limited to the MBM case, not let loose on the Bureau of Building Construction, as it would be under the Johnson-Carr bill now before the legislature. [Bellotti] The blue ribbon commission was my idea and I still believe in it. I believe that within the parameters where you can have some success, you can accomplish something. I do not believe it should be used

as a political vehicle to say let's investigate every contract in the BBC because you're not going to accomplish anything. You're raising the level of expectations. You do not have the resources. You're going to get your eye off the target, the MBM target, and the bill as it presently exists does just that. [Lydon] But that now is the legislature's problem. For Bellotti as attorney general, there's only one MBM allegation left that's not too old to prosecute. It involves a $10,000 payment to Governor Sargent's fundraiser, Toots Manzi. The deadline for an indictment is May 23rd. On that subject Bellotti, depending on your point of view, is discreet like a prosecutor or coy like a politician. [Bellotti] By the time May 23rd runs/arrives, and the statue of limitations has run, I will have done everything that can humanly be done to bring that case to a conclusion.